


everything is fine in heaven (but i’ll never get to know)

by kashxy



Category: Hannibal (TV)
Genre: Biting, Blood Play, Cannibalism, Childhood Trauma, Drugging, M/M, Mild Gore, Mild Regression, NSFW, PTSD, Painplay, Psychological Torture, Sexual Content, Trauma, kidnap, psychological abuse
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-23
Updated: 2020-09-23
Packaged: 2021-03-07 22:34:35
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,095
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26595319
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kashxy/pseuds/kashxy
Summary: He’d come with the intention to destroy. He’d come with his gun and his closed fists and enough anger and pain in his body to last him sixty lifetimes and never run out. He’d looked at Hannibal in the kitchen, narrowed his eyes, swallowed down the sickness rising in his throat, and been prepared to kill. Prepared to destroy.Lying with his legs somewhere hoisted in the air, body too limp to think straight, he doesn’t want to destroy Hannibal at all, doesn’t even want to hurt him anymore. And it terrifies him.
Relationships: Hannibal Lecter & Jack Crawford, Jack Crawford & Alana Bloom, Will Graham/Hannibal Lecter
Kudos: 19





	everything is fine in heaven (but i’ll never get to know)

**Author's Note:**

> title - angels of porn II by nicole dollanganger

It happens on a Friday, over dinner. It’s raining outside. Looks cold.

He realises it halfway through, too late to pull his canines from the meat he knows used to be a human, too early to spit it out on the plate and throw up all over Hannibal’s perfectly handcrafted resin slicked dining table.

He’d never been good at hiding his emotions. He knows Hannibal catches on as soon as his eyes crinkle, as soon as his mouth twists, as soon as his fingers grip that little bit tighter on his knife and fork. Hannibal sets his own fork down, and cocks his head slightly to the left.

Will doesn’t remember much after that. He remembers Hannibal going to get him another drink, his very eyes pinning him to the seat. Will’s not sure he would’ve ran even if he’d had the chance. And then it was just quiet. Nothing.

Maybe he should’ve ran, though. Maybe he should’ve ignored the biting irresistible pull in the back of his head, dragging him towards wherever Hannibal was at all times, keeping him tied to a place he knew wasn’t safe, keeping him frigid and frozen and terrified like he’s been his whole goddamn life.

Maybe he wouldn’t be here, if he’d have ran.

It smells like blood. Blood, as Will found out when he was nine and found his mother dead in a bathtub, smells like rust and the number thirteen and church bells on a Sunday. Blood, as Will’s been finding out ever since he’s been in this chair, tied and bound and drugged up to his eyeballs, smells like Hannibal.

He should’ve noticed it early. Should’ve seen the signs.

“Eyes open, Will.” Hannibal says, his voice sliding over the consonants. His accent is intriguing, all strung together and entirely vocal at the same time.

There’s not a single fibre in Will’s body that wants to disobey. He wants to be here, wants to dirty himself almost as much as he wanted to quit the FBI the exact moment he started. He wants to feel grimy and have a reason for it, wants to hurt and ache and not feel like an imposter for doing so.

 _Will_ , he hears, and then again, _Will_ , louder, louder, louder, until he snaps his eyes open and Hannibal’s leaning down on his knees in front of the chair, his hands big and clean and gentle and it doesn’t smell like blood at all anymore.

He blinks. Blinks again. Hannibal’s still there. Will’s own wrists aren’t tied to the arm of the wooden chair. Hannibal’s mouth isn’t smeared with the blood of a man Will doesn’t know ( _or maybe he does know him and it’s just easier to pretend he doesn’t_.)

“Will.” He hears, and it’s coming from Hannibal’s mouth now, not from every corner in his mind, bouncing off the walls and throwing it back into the middle of his brain until he’s left with a massive headache and the echoing of his name in happy tones, in angry tones, in whispered, painful, strained tones. “Will. You’re here.”

He nods, barely there, and lets Hannibal pull him to his feet, his skin crawling with exhaustion as he lets him lean and sway and blink himself back to consciousness. Black cloud fills his brain, etching its way in the blank spaces between the echoes of his voice and the overwhelming urge to _bite_ , to bite flesh and bone and grind until his teeth wear out.

The stairs, like everything else in the house Will hasn’t seen the outside of in three months, are pristine and wooden, easily cleaned. Easy to strip blood from, should the need arise.

( _The need arises almost every week, but Will’s mind blocks this out without being asked to. It’s natural at this point; a survival mechanism._ )

When Hannibal sits him in the sleek brown chair that grows horns every time he sees it, he does it with a gentle smile and a kiss to the side of Will’s head, gently pressed somewhere between the curls of his hair that’ve grown too long, and the thrumming pulse in front of his ear. It feels homely, leaves a tingle that never seems to fully leave. His whole body’s tingling when Hannibal steps away from him, too hypersensitive to go more than a few minutes without contact.

Dinner doesn’t come tonight. Instead, Will blinks and suddenly he’s laying on his back on the brown table, his tailbone aching against the wood. Hannibal’s hands are on him, on his hips, on the very inner flesh of his thighs, in his hair, pulling, pulling, pulling, and Will doesn’t make a single sound.

Hannibal likes him like this, but he doesn’t like the silence. He pulls and prods and strains, beating and biting and slapping until finally, _finally_ , Will blinks and he’s screaming, groaning, arching into Hannibal’s touch like it’s the last thing he’ll ever do.

Hannibal likes it. His hands grow gentle, even though they’re harder than expected, callouses painted across his palms like he’s never missed a day of heavy work in his life. He looks too dainty, with his neatly pressed suits and his elegant culinarily skills and the way his hands so gently caress Will’s hair on the days he’s too scared to move, too scared to breath, too scared to survive. Will used to watch him play the piano, indulging himself on a fantasy where he wasn't stiffly compliant and full of drugs. Hannibal was everything he'd always wanted; loving, older, talented and polite. Perfect in every way, and somehow even more perfect in the way he's careful and psychopathic and cannibalistic. It's almost scary, the way Will's learning to adore both sides of him exactly the same.

He loses the gentle touch when Will pulls him impossibly closer, arching and whining and whimpering when Hannibal wraps both his hands around his neck, squeezing until it feels like his pulse’ll burst straight from his throat. It feels good, feels like he’s not as numb anymore, and he wants Hannibal to squeeze harder, to squeeze the very life out of him and bring him back together with perfectly hand crafted pieces of his personality.

“Will.” He breathes out, so hot, so strained, but incredibly wary, too, terrified of breaking him because he so badly wants to.

Will knew he was a serial killer. He knew it the moment he put his foot onto the first step on that fateful Thursday that he entered this house and never left. He could smell the blood, could feel every inch of his skin crawling, could recognise the traits of a psychopath within Hannibal because he himself had been turned into one. Who knew one better than ones self, he’d asked Jack once, and gotten a blank stare in return.

He’d come with the intention to _destroy_. He’d come with his gun and his closed fists and enough anger and pain in his body to last him sixty lifetimes and never run out. He’d looked at Hannibal in the kitchen, narrowed his eyes, swallowed down the sickness rising in his throat, and been prepared to kill. Prepared to destroy.

Lying with his legs somewhere hoisted in the air, body too limp to think straight, he doesn’t want to destroy Hannibal at all, doesn’t even want to hurt him anymore. And it terrifies him.

Hannibal pushes forward, folding his body over the top of Will's, and suddenly they’re closer than ever before, so close that they share a breath with every agonised inhale, speaking into each other and biting down every word that doesn’t fit. Hannibal swallows most of Will’s words, reduces him to a trembling, aching mess, his hands flailing against the table, the sound of glass shattering loud in his ear.

Hannibal’s head is down, almost on the table, his breaths steady, and Will hates it. He wants him to _break_ , aches for him to fall apart and lose his sense of awareness and go _feral_ , wants him to bite and claw and growl and draw blood. He wants him _messy_.

The sharp cool of glass against his throat makes Will whine, louder than before, mewling like an injured kitten and feeling exactly the same. Hannibal’s pressing down, hard enough to draw blood, but holding himself back, pulling every ounce of his power into his hips instead, even when Will aches for it to be the opposite.

“Harder.” Will breathes, not sure which side of the spectrum he's aching for. Hannibal pauses for the slightest of seconds, like his brain’s flipping something around and doubting it all in the same breaths, before he pulls out and rips Will off the table, slamming him down on his stomach so he’s pressed unbearably hard against the wood, his cheek slicked with drool and sweat and tears.

Hannibal’s hand is in his hair, but Will's pulling harder, straining against the pressure, pulling so his neck is arched back and he’s staring straight into the eyes of his former doctor, at the serial killer he’d been trying to catch for months without knowing he was just underneath his nose, at the only man he’s ever loved in his whole life so deeply, so agonisingly.

“Hurt me.” He chokes, but it sounds weak and scratches against his throat.

Hannibal understands. He seems to know exactly what Will wants before he even knows himself.

He brings the piece of glass to Will’s throat, pressing again, this angle allowing him to put all his energy into slamming Will into the table by his hips rather than slitting his throat here and now. Will’s still not sure whether he wants it or not, but he’s sure if Hannibal wanted to kill him, he would’ve done so the day he tried to run.

He knows Hannibal is close by the way his hips stutter, by the way he drives himself forward that much more viciously, his hand tightening in Will’s curls, pulling and pressing. Will whines and pulls back, wanting to alight the hurt, make it bite harder.

Hannibal leans in to his shoulder, his hand snapping Will’s head back by his forehead rather than his curls, his teeth scraping their way against the smooth, too pale, bruised skin of his neck. He bites, quick and sharp and Will _gasps_ , arching back again because yes, _yes_ , he needs to _hurt_ , needs to know he’s still alive, needs something other than empty space to fill his bones.

The glass is pressing harder, blood dripping into the curve of Will’s collarbone, and it feels hot, like fire licking against the bone underneath his skin. Hannibal licks it up, like he does, with a groan that sounds like immense, irrevocable pleasure, the cannibal in him alighting a deadly spark in Will’s stomach. He feels sick, but he’s no better himself, never denying the human meat Hannibal feeds him, never saying no. He's tried to find the difference between himself and Hannibal, and came up so short it made him throw up all over his bare feet. He doesn't even try anymore.

"Will. You're here." Hannibal says, and although he sounds steady, his hands grip tighter, pressing deeper, straining harder.

Will doesn't think he is here, but he stays silent, reduces to mewling and whining and crying, hot tears shocking him despite how Hannibal simply licks them like he'd pulled them from Will's tear ducts with his own careful fingers. He kisses Will's eyelids, forcing them closed, and rips the glass across his neck, slitting the epidermis it rests on.

Will gasps, his body tingling, terror flooding him from his feet to his neck. He finally _feels_ , feels everything all at once, terror and lust and confusion and pain drowning him until he's crying. He clenches his teeth together, winces as a spurt of blood reaches his jawline, and comes right into Hannibal's larger hand without another thrust.

Hannibal takes his time after that, slowing down and then quickening his thrusts, his hand clenched tight around Will's neck even if it is only for the purpose of slowing the bleeding. Will just goes limp, silent, like he's trying to detach himself from reality and begging to stay all the same. Hannibal seems like he wants to do everything and nothing all at once, never giving Will what he wants but shoving it halfway down his throat, letting it choke him, letting it rest.

"Will." He says, muffled, like his mouth is full of blood, like he's the one choking, like he's the one struggling.

When he comes, it's with a groan, nowhere near animalistic but close enough that Will jumps and pulls away from his hand, the movement opening the slit across the left half of his throat, aggravating it till the blood is pouring out onto the wood below him and into each curl of the hair at the nape of his neck. Hannibal hates mess. He hates imperfection.

Which is odd, Will thinks as Hannibal takes him in his arms, pressing against the cut, trying to cease the bleeding, because he himself is the complete opposite of perfect, the complete opposite of what he'd describe as stable and solid and flawless. Maybe the lines of Hannibal's definition of perfection blurred in his eyes from someone like himself, to someone like Will. Maybe he sees the imperfections as some ugly quintessential traits of atypical perfection. 

It's even odder, Will thinks as Hannibal picks him gently off the table, ignoring the tears and the blood and the choked sobs Will's sure are tumbling wildly from his lips, that he doesn't care about the blood staining the wood. Hannibal had a thing about his furniture, like he had a thing about his food or about Will himself. An infatuation. An overwhelming, unhealthy need to protect. A maladjusted hyper fixation.

"Will." He says, and that's all he ever seems to say, is Will's name. Almost like every time he says it, it feels different in his mouth and he wants to try and hold onto each different feeling for as long as he possibly can. Maybe Will's name in his mouth is to him what pain is to Will himself.

He cleans the wound quietly, gently, like he's been doing it his whole life. Will laughs, gurgling through his throat and opening the wound further, because Hannibal killed people for the selfish reason of simply eating them, yet he'd been saving lives for twenty years prior. It's hysterically ironic in the worst way, and Will sometimes wonders if he was always like this, always a murderous psychopath who tortured people emotionally, but the thought makes his head pound, so he doesn't linger on it for too long.

"Gently." Hannibal whispers, the words a sliver of a thing against Will's ear. "Don't strain."

Will just coughs. 

*

It's the day after when Will comes to, and his throat hurts, but he's still alive. It's bandaged, clean and hidden from outside bacteria, even though he's sure he passed out somewhere between Hannibal biting down on the open flesh and licking the blood straight from his skin.

Everything aches as he strains his head upwards, vaguely aware of a wet substance at the base of his collarbone. His wrists ache, like they've been tied down for months. They have, Will thinks with a gurgled snort, even if it hasn’t always been physically.

"You're awake." A voice says, and Will doesn't have to turn to know Hannibal's watching him from the doorway. He just pulls again, rattling the handcuffs against the bed posts, and spits up the blood and saliva choking him in his throat. "Silly boy."

Will passes out.

*

When he comes to again, he's not in bed. He's standing in the middle of Hannibal's kitchen, all by himself, and there's a dead body on the floor.

It's large, the skin dark, the eyes glazed but still serious and angry and holding the weight of the world in them. It's missing a leg, but it's otherwise pristine, one hand still clutching the gun it'd used to defend itself. It looks familiar. It smells like blood, and Will cocks his head at his former boss, too afraid to blink.

"Jack Crawford." Hannibal says, like Will wouldn't have known. "Come in."

Will blinks. There's no body. He's sat in the dining room, staring at a table laid out for three. It smells like food, like meat, nothing like rusty blood.

"Doctor Lecter." Jack says, his voice happy and booming. Will jumps. "I assume Will is here?"

 _Of course I'm here_ , Will thinks, but he can't speak, because the slit in his throat throbs. _Where else would I be?_

"Of course." Hannibal responds, his voice caressing each letter. He sounds smooth, like Will's blood had been smooth on this very table just a few nights ago. "He's right through here."

Footsteps are approaching, but Will's too busy trying to remember what he'd actually been pressed against when Hannibal had cut him, hurt him, _fucked_ him, because there's absolutely no traces of blood anywhere. He traces each curve of the timber with unblinking eyes, every break and crack and corner, but there's nothing, nothing that he could use to protect himself, nothing that proves that any of it, any of it at all, was real.

"Will?" Jack asks, his voice tentative like he's already asked three times.

Will snaps his eyes up, but he moves slower than he'd have liked. It's like everything's moving in double speed except himself, like he's lagging too much to know what's real and what's not.

"Mr. Crawford."

Jack looks up, behind Will, his eyebrows drawn together. Hannibal's hand is steady on Will's shoulder, and he doesn't flinch.

"Childhood trauma." Hannibal says, the doctor seeping back into his voice, the steadiness, the smoothness, like he wasn't allowing gentle words to slip past the same lips that devoured human meat on the same exact table he'd fucked Will on, had slit his throat and then acted like he _cared_. "He's regressing into young adulthood, like an adolescent child. It is a common coping mechanism."

Jack nods, like he doesn't want to linger on the topic too long. Will wonders why he doesn't leave now, why he bothers staying.

Maybe it's the same reason Will never left. Maybe it's the reason that even when he knew Hannibal was dangerous, he still kept coming, kept aching, kept craving his gentle touches a whole lot more than his heart warned him to stay away. Maybe that's just what Hannibal does, what he's best at. He takes and takes and takes and you stay, just on the off chance he'll finally give. 

And he does. Will's living proof of that. The ache in his stomach is. The cut on his neck is. The lost hairs at the back of his are. Everything about him is proof that Hannibal will give something, and as long as he does that, Will'll never go anywhere.

"This is wonderful." Jack comments, cutting through a piece of meat. It's a stomach, and the girl's screaming, her mouth wide open and her head thrown back, her hair snaking its way onto Hannibal's plate. She's screaming, dying, crying.

Will flinches at the sound, catching Hannibal's watchful eye from across the table. He knows, knows that Will's seeing things again, knows that he's inches away from a meltdown. Will shivers and swallows past the harsh lump in the middle of his throat, keeping the gaze, his whole body shaking, knowing that Hannibal's face will ground him as long as he keeps staring at his calm, gentle blue eyes, knowing that it’ll make everything seem normal if he just steadies his breathing and tries to ignore the screams of pain coming from just across the table.

He takes a sip from his glass of red wine, but it smells like blood and tastes sour in his mouth. If Jack notices their stare, he doesn't comment on it. Will's not even sure Jack's alive.

It feels like minutes before he begins to leave, proving his aliveness by the way his eyes linger on Will just a little too long. Hannibal shifts and Will tenses.

Jack grabs his coat because it's snowing outside ( _had it really been that long?_ ) and lets Hannibal lead him towards the door. Will tries to ignore the constant sound of screaming coming from the doorstep, and allows himself to think.

Why hadn't Jack said anything? Why hadn't he noticed the bandage around his neck. Why hadn't he said anything? Why hadn't he saved him?

Will's crying before he can answer his own questions, ugly, painful sobs that tear through the bandage around his neck, wracking right through him until he's banging his head on the table so violently that he's sure his head'll crack before the wood will. He bangs and bangs and bangs, crying throughout, not caring if anyone hears, hoping someone does.

"Will." Hannibal says, voice calm and steady like it always is, never saying anything else. It makes Will smash his head against the table impossibly harder, screaming and sobbing because he just wants to feel something other than this stupid aching, this constant fuzz of never knowing which way is up and which way is down. "Will, you’re going to hurt yourself."

Will wants to tell him that that's the point. He wants to yell and cry and scream that he knows this isn't real and that with every bang of his head against this stupidly perfect table, the same table he'd bled on, the same table he'd come on, the same table he'd seen a woman dying and crying and screaming on, a little piece of him comes back, a little piece he lost between the walls of Hannibal's basement, his kitchen, his bedroom.

"Will." Hannibal says again, and his voice sounds shaky, worried. He pulls at Will's shoulders, cradling his lolling head, and holds it steady, his grip strong enough that Will can't move, can't move at all. "Stop it."

And Will breaks.

*

He wakes up in the hospital, the gentle sound of beeping lulling him from his unconsciousness. It’s an easy transition, helps him come to terms with the light blinding him straight in the retinas, of the painful aching of a large bump on his head, of the fact that he _knows_ Hannibal’s watching him.

“Where am I?” He asks, even though it’s painfully obvious. His throat thrums as Hannibal moves closer, his expression smooth and pleased at Will’s awakening.

“You’re in the hospital, Will.” Hannibal sighs, one hand ghosting over Will’s fingertips. “You tried to kill yourself.”

Will swallows, but he doesn’t say anything. He thinks he trusts his own voice less than he trusts the words of a man who drugged and cut and tortured him in a house he never wanted to leave.

The next few hours pass, or maybe it’s only a few minutes, or maybe it's days. Will can’t tell, but when he asks Hannibal, it’s been two days and he’s been unconscious for thirty six of the forty eight hours in the hospital. Maybe the older man isn’t telling him the truth, but the only truth Will can trust anymore is Hannibal’s, so he sets himself on that and lets it be done with.

The hospital isn’t very intriguing. Jack Crawford comes to visit, and Will barely utters a word, tugging on the strands of his hair until Hannibal's hands take the place between his fingers instead of hair, helping him play up the regression role unconsciously. It makes Hannibal happy, makes him lean down softly and press a gentle kiss against his temple when no ones looking, and if that isn’t all he wants, then he’s not sure of anything anymore.

Alana Bloom comes to visit when they’re leaving the hospital with a pack of dogs Will doesn’t recognise. They come bounding over, a little scruffy one in particular following Will even as he stumbles backwards. Will frowns and kicks at him with a frightened yelp that comes from the dog. He doesn’t catch him with his boot, but he channels enough anger into his aura that it makes the little brown thing run back to Alana with its tail between its legs.

When they leave, Hannibal strapping him into the passenger seat with knowing hands, hands that linger on his thighs and on his hips and on his shoulders, Will catches sight of Alana Bloom crying. He doesn’t feel anything.

*

Will doesn’t think home feels like home anymore.

Hannibal fucks him into the wooden table, and then it feels a bit more like home.


End file.
